China certifies COMAC C919

On 29 September a special ceremony was held at Beijing in which the COMAC C919 was officially issued its type-certifcate. With this certificate, the manufacturer can now start delivery of aircraft to launch customer China Eastern Airlines. The airline, however, said that it doesn't expect to take delivery of a first C919 before next year and then only four in 2023. Next step for the C919 is to receive its production certificate in order to ramp-up production to significant numbers, as well as certification by other aviation authorities like the FAA and EASA. Without approvals from these latter authorities, the C919 can only fly within China or to close Chinese allies.

Development of the 168-seat aircraft began in 2008 and is China's attempt to compete with the Airbus A320neo and Boeing B737MAX. It flew for the first time on 5 May 2017 and is being produced at COMAC's facility at Shanghai-Pudong Airport. The C919 is powered by either CFM Leap- or ACAE CJ-1000 engines and also utilises many Western avionics. This also impacted the development process as the US has increased sanctions on several of these technologies over the last few years.

According to COMAC, the manufacturer has secured 815 orders from 28 customers. So far, however, only China Eastern Airlines has officially firmed-up its order and announced a potential timeline of introduction of the C919 in the fleet. Other airlines and lessors committed to the C919 are airlines like Air China, China Southern Airlines, GECAS, Hainan Airlines, Sichuan Airlines, BOCOMM Leasing and Heibei Airlines.

Photo by COMAC.